Mets' bats pound Twins into submission as executives ponder trade deadline
Mets right fielder Jesse Winker looks to the dugout as he runs on his single against the Minnesota Twins during the fifth inning of an MLB baseball game at Citi Field on Monday, July 29, 2024. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
On the eve of the trade deadline, in a 15-2 win over the Twins on Monday night, the Mets received a reminder: Prospects are people too. And sometimes those people grow up to become major leaguers.
The Mets dealt their former farmhand, righthander Simeon Woods Richardson, his worst start of the season by putting seven consecutive batters on base, and scoring six of them, to begin the bottom of the fourth inning.
That represented an outlier of an implosion for Woods Richardson, who entered with a 3.27 ERA in 17 outings. He finished 3 1/3 innings charged with six runs, seven hits and three walks.
“That’s my boy,” said Mark Vientos, who burned his former minor-league roommate for a double during the Mets’ big inning, still talks to him almost every day and planned to buy him dinner after the game. “I’m going to tell him, ‘Thank you for keeping me locked in.’”
Woods Richardson has come a long way since 2019, when the Mets traded him to Toronto in the deal that brought Marcus Stroman to Queens. Still only 23 years old, he has become one of the better starting pitchers for the Twins, who are 58-47 and hold an American League wild-card spot.
Giving up a far-away minor leaguer who might, and only might, be a future contributor is the sort of risk the Mets’ front office has been analyzing in recent days.
They have until 6 p.m. Tuesday to make trades with other clubs. Do they add another reliever? A starter? A bigger piece, under team control beyond this season, for a greater prospect penny?
The modus operandi for president of baseball operations David Stearns and his inner circle of executives so far: relatively minor moves at relatively minor cost. They have acquired outfielder Jesse Winker plus relievers Phil Maton and Ryne Stanek for two mid-tier prospects (plus cash or a player to be named).
Owner Steve Cohen hired Stearns in part to continue to build up the farm system. Moving significant pieces, for the sake of going for it in 2024, would run counter to that mission.
The Mets (56-50) will get an answer soon.
“We have one more day left,” said lefthander Jose Quintana, who held the Twins to one run in six innings. “I’m just thinking, bring more players to help us and keep going. We’re in the race. We stick together.”
Pete Alonso said: “We’ve put ourselves in a really good position. In order to feel comfortable at the deadline, you got to be in a winning situation. We’ve earned that. We’ve put ourselves in that position. And we’ve done a great job bouncing back. This is such a resilient bunch.”
As for the players the Mets already have: A bunch contributed in major ways in the series opener. Alonso homered to open the fourth and added an RBI double later. Jeff McNeil and Luis Torrens drove in three runs apiece, Brandon Nimmo and J.D. Martinez two each.
The Twins put outfielder Matt Wallner on the mound in the seventh inning. He recorded the final four outs by lobbing mostly 41-mph meatballs.
In his first start after coming over in a trade with the Nationals on Sunday, Winker played five innings in rightfield. Manager Carlos Mendoza mentioned before the game that the Mets “have to be careful there with his workload” since Winker hadn’t played the outfield in a month.
“Once we got that lead [and] three really good at-bats [from Winker], I thought it was good to just get him out,” Mendoza said.
Tyrone Taylor, who replaced Winker, robbed Ryan Jeffers of a home run with a leaping grab at the wall in the seventh inning.
Jose Butto tossed the final three innings to pick up the save, his second appearance of that length in five days. He pitched that long in part, Mendoza said, to keep him stretched out in case the Mets move him back to the rotation in the coming days or weeks.
That decision may well hinge on the Mets’ trade activity.
“That’s part of the conversation,” Mendoza said. “I thought it was important to keep his pitch count up. We’ll see what happens.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
